Health jobs to go in $6m blowout

Hannah Busch
eatures and Special Publications Editor
Hannah began writing for APN newspapers in Hervey Bay and Maryborough in 2011, writing about everything from the prize-winning sausages to murder trials. She joined the team at the Queensland Times in early 2014 as editor of City Heart and Roughin It magazines.

ELEVEN staff working on fixed terms in health services across West Moreton will not see out their original contracts.

Staff members were told this week their temporary contracts would finish earlier than planned to help rein in a budget set to go into the red - to the tune of $6 million - at the end of the financial year.

"There will be no impact on delivery of health services at the front line," West Moreton Hospital and Health Service chief executive officer Sue McKee said.

Ms McKee first announced a review into all temporary arrangements in an email to staff earlier this month.

More than 1900 people work on temporary contracts across the network, which covers services from Ipswich to Esk.

She told staff in the email that budget constraints were necessary because staff numbers had increased over the past year without a corresponding increase in activity.

But staff numbers had already been going down since July, dropping from 3527 at the start of the 2015-16 financial year to 3471 as of February 12 this year.

WMHHS is also due to treat thousands more people this financial year than it did in the previous financial year.

Health service statistics released to the QT show it is forecast to treat 51,980 patients in its wards, 269,186 outpatients and 73,572 people across its emergency departments in the 2015-16 financial year that ends in four months.

The forecast is an increase of more than 30,000 compared to the final number of patients in the 2014-15 financial year.

The service treated 49,364 patients discharged from a ward, 234,818 outpatients and 70,431 people in the emergency department.